Over the last 15 years we've trialled almost 100 different varieties of sweet peas, looking for delicious scent as our number one requirement. These are the very best varieties, pinched out for strong, long-flowering and highly productive plants.

No garden is complete without sweet peas. Grow them over arches, teepees and trellis and plant them with your runner beans to draw lots of insect pollinators into your veg patch.

We sow our highly-scented, old-fashioned sweet pea seeds in the winter, as well as in the spring, so that you will have excellent productive plants throughout the summer.

Sow October-December or January-March, 2 seeds into 1 rootrainer. When roots fill container, pot on 2 seedlings together into a 1 litre pot. Pinch out tips when plants have 4 pairs of leaves. If autumn sown, overwinter in a light, cool place. Sweet peas often have quite a hard seed coat so it may help to soften the seed before sowing. To do this, place the seeds on some damp kitchen paper and pop them in a warm spot. Once the seeds start to swell or sprout they are ready to sow. If the seeds don’t seem to be swelling you can try making a small nick in the seed coat (opposite the ‘eye’) as this will help moisture enter the seed and kick-start the germination process.

Care Tips

Remove the climbing tendrils as they grow. Tie the stem into your framework on a regular basis. Can be grown in deep container pots up a climbing frame. Find out how to cordon train your sweet pea in Sarah's how-to guide.

Flowering

May - August (winter-sown) or June - September (spring-sown), or 12-14 weeks from spring-sowing of seed.